* * * * * MEMORABLE DAYS. * * * * * COLLOP MONDAY. Collop Monday is the day before Shrove Tuesday, and in many parts is made a day of great feasting on account of the approaching Lent. It is so called, because it was the last day allowed for eating animal food before Lent; and our ancestors cut up their fresh meat into collops, or steaks, for salting or hanging up until Lent was over; and even now in many places it is still a custom to have eggs and collops, or slices of bacon, for dinner on this day. In Westmoreland, and particularly at Brough, where I have witnessed it many times, the good people kill a great many pigs about a week or two previous to Lent, which have been carefully fattened up for the occasion. The good housewife is busily occupied in salting the flitches and hams to hang up in the "pantry," and in cutting the fattest parts of the pig for collops on this day. The most luscious cuts are baked in a pot in an oven, and the fat poured out into a bladder, as it runs out of the meat, for hog's-lard. When all the lard has been drained off, the remains (which are called _cracklings_, being then baked quite crisp) resemble the crackling on a leg of pork, are eaten with potatoes, and from the quantity of salt previously added to them, to preserve the lard, are unpalatable to many mouths. The rough farmers' men, however, devour them as a savoury dish, and every time "lard" is being made, _cracklings_ are served up for the servants' dinner. Indeed, even the more respectable classes partake of this dish. PIG-FRY--This is a Collop Monday dish, and is a necessary appendage to "_cracklings_." It consists of the fattest parts of the entrails of the pig, broiled in an oven. Numerous herbs, spices, &c. are added to it; and upon the whole, it is a more sightly "_course_" at table than fat cracklings. Sometimes the good wife indulges her house with a pancake, as an assurance that she has not forgotten to provide for Shrove Tuesday. The servants are also treated with "a drop of something good" on this occasion; and are allowed (if they have nothing of importance to require their immediate attention) to spend the afternoon in conviviality. AVVER BREAD.--During Lent, in the same county, a great quantity of bread, called avver bread, is made. It is of _oats_, leavened and kneaded into a large, thin, round cake, which is placed upon a "_girdle_"[17] over the fire. The bread is about the thickness of a "lady's" slice of bread and butter.